document.write( "Question 1185802: Nate and Bob are 25 years old together. 5 years ago, Nate was 4 times older than Bob. How old are they now? \n" ); document.write( "
Algebra.Com's Answer #816645 by greenestamps(13200)\"\" \"About 
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\n" ); document.write( "Unfortunately, some people who write math problems don't now how to speak English....

\n" ); document.write( "(1) \"Nate and Bob are 25 years old together\" is very poor English; it means that each of them is 25 years old. But that would make the problem nonsensical.

\n" ); document.write( "Undoubtedly the intended information is that the sum of their ages is 25.

\n" ); document.write( "(2) Apparently very few people know the difference between \"4 times older than\" and \"4 times as old as\"; in sloppy everyday English, they are nearly always used to mean the same thing. But \"4 times older than\" means as old as, PLUS 4 TIMES MORE as old, which therefore means 5 times AS OLD.

\n" ); document.write( "It's like where a 400% increase means the new value is the old 100%, plus 400% more -- so the new value is 500% of the old value.

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\n" ); document.write( "So in both of the sentences of your post which give information to be used in the problem, we don't know what the information is.

\n" ); document.write( "Re-post, using correct and precise language.

\n" ); document.write( "If -- as is definitely possible -- you have shown the problem exactly as it was given to you, then we can only say we're sorry; neither we nor you can solve the problem if we don't know what the problem is.

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